Character progression and leveling up that baby character from infancy to max level is always one (if not my most favorite parts) of an MMO. Considering I usually have a severe case of ‘altitis’ when I first jump into a new MMO, and I’ll be making at least a small army of new characters, leveling is pretty important to me. I’ll be doing it more than once and love the experience of character building.
So, with that mind – let’s take a brief look at this foolish man’s interpretation of leveling up in Star Wars: The Old Republic (that is – based on what we know so far… Come on and drop already, SWTOR!!) But I digress…
A good example of how you won't be picking up quests in SWTOR.
I’m sporting a brand new level one Padawan! Now what?
Creating a character in SWTOR will give us the opportunity to pick between any of the available class/race combinations and once that’s done we’re plopped down on one of the different Origin worlds.
Depending on which class you pick, your Origin will vary. Race won’t have much of a distinguishing factor regarding which planet you’ll end up on, other than limiting which classes you can choose from.
The starter worlds are Tython, Ord Mantell, Korriban, and Hutta. Jedi of all kinds will begin on Tython, while Smugglers & Troopers will blast off from Ord Mantell. On the Empire side, Both Sith Inquisitors and Warriors will be starting on Korriban; while Bounty Hunters & Imperial Agents will start on Hutta.
It’s nice to know we’ll get some variety in terms of starting locations, as when you re-roll you’ll have some different quest & story opportunities to check on the varying Origin worlds.
Origin worlds themselves should take anywhere from 5-7 hours to complete and will get us to level 10. The Origin worlds seem to be mostly about introducing you to the game, getting you situated with your character and personal storyline and of course – killing things.
"You must move on, this is only your Origin World young Jedi..."
You won’t be experiencing your Advanced Class, starships, or vehicles on the Origin world – but don’t stress; it’s a hop, skip, and a jump away to get your starship once you’ve finished with your Origin world. Origin worlds are supposed to be much “smaller” in comparison to other planets, so it’s not that surprising you’re not getting to experience all the good stuff right off the bat.
Although you won’t be riding cruisers around, it does seem that the Origin worlds will have access to crafting – so you will be able to dive into that aspect of gameplay at a pretty early level. You’ll also be acquiring at least one Companion on the Origin world, which is another important and distinctive gameplay mechanic BioWare wants to introduce to you early.
Once you complete your Origin world, you will/may be asked to return occasionally for quests and lore-related activities. But as with progression in most games, ultimately you’ll be packing up your droids and heading out for more threatening adventures.
Newbie lands, DONE. Now… Where is MY starship?
With the completion of the Origin worlds, we should be brought to level 10. 10 is a big one for our characters in SWTOR, as you’ll get access to your Capital planet, a starship, your Advanced Class options, and access to PvP (as far as I’m aware.)
Departing your Origin world leaves you with the opportunity to head to your Capital planet, either Coruscant for the Republic or Dromund Kaas for the Empire. Once there you’ll be able to acquire a quest-line that will ultimately lead you to pick up your shiny new personal starship. Each class has its own defining starship and variety is always nice, giving each class that extra ‘umpf’ when it comes to customization. (Note that both Jedi classes apparently share the “Defender” ship and Sith classes share the “Fury” starship.)
With the completion of the Origin world and upon reaching level 10, our future characters will gain access to their Advanced Class. ACs allow you to choose from 2 different paths, focusing your character’s role to a much greater degree (for example, more toward healing or tanking.)
Because really, who doesn't want their own private starship?
As with many MMOs, it seems once you get to the mid-level range your opportunity to level up and grow expands even more. You’re given access to more Flashpoints, Warzones, Space Combat, and the rest of the gameplay mechanics you’ve already experienced will presumably be expanded upon.
Tatooine is another mid-level area, and one of the first mid-level areas where players from both factions will frequently be mingling. Our characters will begin to start exploring Tatooine at around level 25, and the planet seems to have a pretty elaborate story to go along with it. Level 25 in general will be another exciting milestone for SWTOR characters, as you’ll also gain access to your first personal vehicle – a speeder-bike.
Another party we’ll get to attend mid-level is the Taral V Flashpoint, which is set for characters around level 32. On top of that, you’ll be battling for supremacy on Alderaan with your opposing faction and as your level increases you’ll most likely gain access to more & more Warzones.
It’s also safe to assume during this time you’ll be picking up most of your companions, with each class getting a total of 5 companions (in addition to a ship droid.) Never fear, there will be plenty to do during our “Mid-level crisis.”
We know most planets will be split up in ‘level’ ranges so you’ll work on one planet for a certain range, complete that, and move on to the next. The devs have stated there will be incentives to return to planets, but in most cases they will have a set narrative to tell with a beginning and an end, so once that’s completed – there won’t be as many reasons to return.
We’re limited to only knowing the level ranges for zones that we have seen gameplay videos for, but as time progresses and we get closer to release – we’ll gain a clearer image of where our characters will need to hangout during their level progression.
I can only hope as a Sith this is what I do everytime I level up.
Also, at least some quests will be ‘inter-planetary’, as they proceed or continue across more than one system – which is something that seems to fit well with the Star Wars Universe. It’s also been indicated that when starting the game, most quest content will be class-oriented, but as you level up and proceed, worlds will revolve less around your specific class story-line and more around the story of the planet itself.
Ding! Max level, now what?
Hitting max level is a feeling of joy and accomplishment.
Of course max level discussion is a big one, and could pretty much lead to its own piece – so we’ll just speak briefly on reaching the level cap in SWTOR. Currently we know that max level for SWTOR is sitting at 50, so once you’re there – you won’t be hearing that glorious level up sound anytime before an expansion sees the light of day.
At this point you’ll have access to end-game raids like the recently shown Eternity Vault, even more PvP Warzones, and some of the other end-game open world content that BioWare has given us glimpses of, and…well, that’s all we know for now.
The Eternity Vault looks great, and Operations (or Raiding) in SWTOR looks to really be bringing deep story to the raiding environment. Having plenty of Operations and large-scale content containing strong narratives and lore-intensive encounters is certainly something that will provide a new twist to end-game. It will be interesting to see how the Operations end up working out.
Although it’s slightly off-topic, I think the Codex and exploration possibilities will add another great twist to player content as taking a break from slaying foolish enemies can always be refreshing and bring another great aspect of gameplay to leveling up.
So that brings me to my weekly question for you, TORWarriors! How are you looking forward to leveling up in SWTOR? Are there any features you’ve seen so far you’re particularly interested in, or anything you’d like to see? Drop a line, let us know!
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Well Leveling up is always a fun part of MMO it is always nice to see your work rewarded, and get new ways to zap people with lightning will be a drive for me, and I agree with the pic of the inquis shooting lighting between hands in that I hope it is the level up animation. It would be fitting. Unlocking all that stuff will be nice but really I look forward tot leveling up to continue the story really, that story is going to keep me going I admit to a bit of an addiction to story, needing to know what comes next has kept me going on a game well past a time I should have been asleep. I started calling it new-game-itus where you must keep playing the game to see whats next. I feel I shall have that a lot in TOR.
I agree with ya there, the involving story in SWTOR is really what’s interesting me the most, besides killing things with Lightsabers. I loved KOTOR, and I’m a fan of most of BioWare’s storytelling so I’m stoked.
Nice read!
I’m looking forward to lvling up with a few good friends in a small group as much as possible.
(side note: both Jedi’s share the same star ship as do the Sith’s)
the only part about leveling I hated was the constant ganking in some zones. High levels would come up to you and kill you while you quested and such, but all else was fine, I leveled 4 characters to max level in Burning crusade in WoW and 2 in Wotlk (one of which was 70 at start, the other a death knight).
Another critical point in the leveling progression is the point at which you can start sending companions on resource-gathering missions.
I know a lot of people are going to be in a rush to get their main toon to max level. But I think you would be crazy not to build up at least a few toons to that intermediate level so you can keep several sets of companions all busy at once.
Your crew can complete work even when the character is not online. So running multiple sets of companions on simultaneous gathering missions will be a huge benefit in terms or resources.
Altoholic signing in here… owner of 20 level 85 characters (10 alliance, 10 horde, half PVP half PVE)… and a slew (maybe 100 characters) of level 20-70s on four different accounts, one for each expansion… *cough*
I have a LOT of spare time on my hands, especially when I have the night shift, and to be honest, I’ve tired of endgame in MMOs fairly quickly so far.
Dear Lord Vader,
What do you do for a living? And how can I get that job?
Well to be honest I am trying out new characters everytime and in EVERY game…sooooooo…the idea of leveling under different environment for each new character is, at the very least, compelling.
Anyway back to the point…lots of alts…great leveling exp…Sold to the gentleman with the black hair!
Great article! One thing I learned with MMO’s is that you should create Alt’s to assist you with crafting. I plan to have a few alt’s early on. I try to get most of them to level 20, then switch back to my main character to max out. I am interested to know about the server choices; how many we will have? I am not a PvP type of player and would like to know more about that aspect as well, i.e., purpose, gear, titles, etc.
Making one of everything! Whats the toon cap per account anyway?
Last I heard it was 8 per server….
Yep yep to the above – I plan to level 4 characters to 10 right off the bat, pick one and choose an advanced class and play it to 25-30. Then decide to either go back and level some of the others to mid level or keep on trucking with my main.
I think this approach (or things similar) is a win-win since I’m not in a hurry to get to end-game in a MMO that is new. The reality is that at launch any new MMO is just not going to have a tremendous amount of end-game content. It jsut does not make financial sense to do so.
Plus, it’s likely that the majority of bugs/issues to be associated with end-game content initially as well.
I’ll let the power gamers deal with all that so by the time I get to it the issues and bugs have been mostly fixed.
I don’t know. It’s kind of a mixed feeling for me. Leveling up is always a joy in an mmorpg. It means you’re stronger, more experienced, and capable of dealing out more damage to enemies and using more skills. That’s awesome, but the greatest joy for me in this game for me will be experiencing the story, as well as actually being able to develop my character into a certain way with a certain personality that I choose that will actually leave it’s mark on the world in my game!
When I played WoW, I had a blood elf paladin that I liked to describe as kind, naive, somewhat childish, yet very powerful and brave. Interesting character description. Yet… I was really only pretending, as my BE’s personality was never shown in the game. Character and story really means a lot to me. It’s one of the reasons I didn’t choose warlock, as I remember a quest where you had to find a good, kind man and cut out his heart in order to gain one of your warlock “pets”. It disturbed me enough to where I just didn’t want to be a warlock, and that class is actually awesome sauce!
See, story is very important to me, as I like to think of my character as out on adventures and whatnot. And the personality of my character should have a bearing on the adventures he has as well as what he does in those adventures and how people react to him. But with my blood elf, as handsome as he was, it was still a bit hard to get too attatched to him as all he really did was stare blankly forward and do whatever I told him to do without saying a word (EVER). The only real personality he had was the one I pretended he had, and that’s just sad. I think what Bioware is doing with TOR is great, as it is their way of telling the world that the time of the silent stick figure mmo mannequin character is over. It’s time mmo players actually gave a crap about their character.
Wow, I went waaaaay off topic, didn’t I? lolz Anyway, back on subject, leveling up to me in this game will probably go unnoticed for the most part. Well, maybe “unnoticed” isn’t the right word, as if I wasn’t leveling up I’d definately notice. But, unlike with other mmos, I won’t be sweating as I look at the experience bar in anticipation. I’ll be too busy finding out some incredible lore or in the middle of kicking butt in PvP or exploring or any number of other fun things to even bother. As far as what I’m interested in when it comes to leveling bonuses, I like the fact that we will actually be getting TWO major mounts, one ground mount and one starship, when we hit the appropriate levels. So far, I haven’t read anything that says we will have to pay for these mounts, unlike in WoW where we actually had to pay an arm and a leg for a ground mount and our firstborn for a flying mount (and all those plus a gallon of our lifeblood for a fast flying mount). I only read that in TOR we will have to unlock these mounts via the appropriate quests. If we really don’t have to pay out the wazoo for these mounts and just have to do the right quests to get them, that will be almost just too much awesome sauce.
I would post other things that have me interested as far as leveling, but I think this post is long enough as it is. lol Anyway, let me stop typing before I get carpal tunnel.
Wow, nice post to boot! I think you’re right, immersion is going to play a big role in helping us probably not even realize we’re leveling, and I’ll probably care a lot more about what plot-point is evolving next then my next level, but I think I’ll always be keeping a very keen eye on what level I am, and where my goals are, as I’m just a numbers guy as well.
I too remember the days of scraping for cash to try and make sure I had enough money to afford my mount when the day come. It certainly wasn’t fun per-say, but I don’t mind it, looking back on it now – but a FREE mount? Now that sounds great, too. I do remember of being envious of Pallies and Warlocks back in WoW when they got their free mount.
that word is curse for me.
I hated that phrase sooo much I would tally a list of people who said it, and refuse to help them if they asked for me.